“Drugs?” I croaked.
“Just marijuana, but it’s illegal here, so he was tagged for it.”
My exhale escaped with just a little bit of tension.
Calder hit his blinker and let off the gas, approaching the Moran Entrance. Every time he turned the wheel one-handed, I stared for just a second too long and clenched my thighs a little tighter.
“Did you check his record because of me? Because I insisted on coming with you?” I had to be the reason for the added caution.
“I checked because the information changed,” he said, his smooth voice filling the weighty silence as he drove through the lot, following signs for campground parking. “Confronting a man who is camping with expired tags is different than confronting a man with a weapon. Tracking a person means knowing your target, and if Brandon has a license to carry, I needed to know if he’d ever used that weapon in ways that were problematic with the law. Weapons charges. Assault.”
“Oh.”
Calder’s attention flicked to my mouth when the sound escaped, and then snapped back. “But yeah, I also wanted to confirm I wasn’t putting you in unreasonable danger by bringing you with me.”
I put a pause on the conversation as we entered the next clearing, the perimeter of the tree-lined lot dotted with campers of all shapes and sizes. “What kind of camper does he have?”
Calder slowed to let an older couple cross the lot in front of us; they waved their thanks, their hiking poles tethered to their wrists.
“Timberleaf teardrop camper. Wyoming plates 23R9-V9,” he recalled without missing a beat, and continued forward.
I scanned each passing vehicle on the right, while Calder took the left. Spot after spot passed, none with the right size or shape vehicle, and no one who remotely resembled the barrel-chested, bearded man who’d grabbed my sister’s phone to curse at me.
The slow thump of my heartbeat rolled almost to a complete stop when we reached the far end of the lot with no luck.
“And if I was in unreasonable danger? If Brandon did have a history of violence?” I couldn’t help but ask, my frustration peaked at the precipice of another failed lead.
“Then you wouldn’t be here,” he said and drove into the secondary lot marked as overflow.
Anger lashed like a hot whip on my spine.He would’ve left me behind even though he’d agreed.
“You would’ve gone back on your word?”
“The only word I gave was to meet me at the diner at eight.”
My mouth opened, but no sound came out. He was right. He hadn’t promised I could come; I’d only assumed.
“You don’t have to like the way I do things, Lara, but you do have to understand why.” The piercing look in his eyes gutted me. “I will never agree to something that could put you in danger. Ever. I won’t spare your feelings at the expense of your safety.”
It was the greatest unfairness, when chivalry could feel cruel.
“There.”
My head snapped forward, all argument forgotten as I zeroed in on the rust-scarred pickup in the farthest corner of the overflow lot; hitched behind it, the teardrop camper was backed discreetly into thewoods, shielding it almost completely from view.Along with its expired registration tags.
Calder slowed and pulled off to the side, making sure it was his door that was closest to Brandon’s truck.
He turned to me, the hard angles of his face even more severe.Even more beautiful.“Violent record or not, once we’re out of the truck, you do exactly as I say, understood?”
Goose bumps spread over my skin. It was a question but not a request. In the hospital, I was responsible for every choice. Every decision. I was the one calling the shots. But not here. Not with him. I’d unpack why that wasn’t as unnerving as it should be later.
I nodded mutely, and he continued. “Even if Rachel is there, Lara, if Brandon is hostile, I need you to still obey me.”
The way he said “obey” made me shiver for all the wrong reasons, the tremble severe enough to make my chin dip.
Calder growled, “I need to hear you say it.”
“I understand,” I confirmed, my breathless response spurring him into action.
